By Ahmed Khan
Behind castles of ivory the children of the bourgeoisie blissfully make merry and at times ponder with misty eyes at what poverty is and what suffering feels like. They scratch their heads in utter confusion on hearing their country being called a third world nation, after all we are the 55 percent of the 180 million people who are the few and the privileged who receive proper education and cherish our experience
as we generate endless fountains of wealth.
With a slipper on one foot and the other bare, a child in torn up Shalwar Kameez haunts a local market place selling dusty coloring books that no one needs. He hums modern Bollywood songs he last heard from local CD shop and makes merry as he scores Rs.1 or Rs.2 from his begging misadventures. Little is known about his family and is parents but it is known to all that this child is wasting his life roaming the streets learning the ways of the beggar. Now is his time to attend classes at a decent school, now is the time to learn lengthy calculations, now is the time to study language, now is the time to be astonished by the mystics of science and now is the time hum hymns and nursery rhymes but this chap, his mistake; poverty, has acted as an obstacle and will not allow to obtain a proper education. According to the Section 9 of the Constitution (18th Amendment) act Article 25A states that “25A. Right to education.—The State shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of five to sixteen years in such manner as may be determined by law.“ Where is this boy’s education? As stated, the state must also be responsible for the lack of education and of the reasons that repel children from attending schools.
Maulanas storm the terraces and the lush mountainous regions, boasting about Allah and how much they adore human rights. Little do they know that they blindfolded by their own ignorance. Their daughters are locked up at homes and are schooled on how their only aim is to serve a man and they are to act as his slave alone, education is not their right and freedom does not exist for them. Rebellious and angry, a young Malala Yousafzai swung the hammer of heresy and declared that all females should be given the right of formal education. Greatly disturbed by the blasphemy, a Taliban gunman pulled the trigger with icy cold fingers. The bullet soared through the cold chilly skies of the north and violently penetrated the feminist’s cheek. Luckily the child was saved and is now an international celebrity but that’s not the point. This grim specter of ignorance haunts the perilous nation leading towards a dysfunctional society with unjust laws against women.
Immigrantsand refugees to add up as the residents of the country as the state itself allowed them to enter. They are provided with zero resources and capital. With no roof to shelter them and no food to satisfy their hunger they construct for themselves their own establishments and houses “illegally”. Their harmless slums and “Kachi Abadis” are like poison to the government. As soon as they find the time to wipe away the sweat from their foreheads and marvel at their new creations, the CDA butts in and bulldoze their life times work. The cold hearted state smiles. Now homeless and penniless, they wander the warm streets. They show no sign of pain as their feet are burnt by the scorching roads. Sleeping underneath bridges and roads and hiding from the cops behind ruins because of urinating upon public walls. This is their life. Instead of helping them the government seeks joy in bullying them. How odd.
The sooth speaker, holy man, frantically roams about crowded areas, chanting “THE END IS NIGH!” His insane behavior is the result of starvation, drought and probably severe exposure to the sun. Hailed as a holy man, the people offer him respect but refuse to aid the diseased man. Luckily he is a survivor standing tall amongst the corpses of his fallen comrades. Drought, famine and intense heat had slaughtered the masses but left a survivor as an indicator of it wrath. Shortage of electricity and poor water sanitation has lead to the deaths of many and the clueless point their fingers towards the ACs that provide cold moderate conditions for the rich to survive. It’s not the fault of the upper-middle class that poor have fallen; we are as clueless as you are! The state failed to provide them with the basic necessities required for living and so they were unluckily hurled into deaths embrace.
Underneath the green and white banner pant the beggars and the poor. The state fails to help them. The public is ignorant. Now as State has refused to play any role in the abolishment of poverty and lack of education, apart from slaughtering the masses, it is up to the ignorant public to lift the blindfolds and to do their best in helping the poor.
